Near-term global risks in the early weeks of the Obama administration

This is a brief thought piece. A colleague called to ask what my near-term global risks in the early weeks of the Obama administration. My reply started with the shortest term risk that was already in countdown:

An Israeli strike against Natanz, Iran before Obama took office, while Bush43 was still president.

Assuming that we get past that hurdle, my risks list adds:

India-Pakistan

Mexico

Not on the short term risk list is the DPRK despite their public pronouncement by a uniformed military officer (a first) that they had "weaponized" (hardened and miniaturized the detonation and implosion mechanics necessary to deliver a fissile package in a conventional missile warhead) sufficient plutonium to create five packages. The DPRK will become a rising risk but at the moment I put them down to ratcheting up their 'salami negotiation' strategy of driving a wedge between ROK and the US, then seeking to arbitrage the difference. Having got all that was possible from the Bush43 administration, they are opening negotiations with the Obama administration.

Israel

Israel was both practicing and signaling its capability to attack the Natanz uranium enrichment plant in 2008:

While timing is not clear from the unclass press, the US had denied a key Israeli request for weapons for the raid:

Israel's effort to obtain [deep-penetration bunker-busting] weapons, refueling capacity and permission to fly over Iraq for an attack on Iran grew out of its disbelief and anger at an American intelligence assessment completed in late 2007 that concluded that Iran had effectively suspended its development of nuclear weapons four years earlier.

A number of Israeli officials have questioned the utility of U.S. dialogue with Iran... In particular, Israeli officials appear wary that a shift in policy toward engagement may weaken the current sanctions efforts aimed at Tehran. Israeli Foreign Minister and potential prime minister Tzipi Livni urged caution about the timing of direct talks, telling Israel Radio Nov. 6 that "premature dialogue at a time where Iran thinks that the world has given up on sanctions may be problematic," adding that such dialogue may be construed as "weakness." When asked if she supported U.S. dialogue with Iran, Livni responded, "[T]he answer is no."

In recognition that U.S. and Israeli aims regarding Iran may diverge, part of Israel's security establishment also appears to fear that a U.S.-Iranian dialogue may be successful in addressing U.S. concerns, but not those of Israel...

Former U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations John Bolton suggested in June that the "optimal window" for Israel to strike Iran would be after the U.S. elections and prior to the inauguration of the new president Jan. 20, noting particularly that "an Obama victory would rule out military action."

Israel has said that it reserves the option to take such an action. In a Nov. 18 Der Spiegel interview, Commander in Chief of the Israeli Air Force Ido Nehushtan said that the air force is "ready to do whatever is demanded of us" to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons, but that such an action "is a political decision."

One of the things one quickly learns about the Israelis is that they rarely ask for permission, or do so on such narrow grounds that they retain an option toignore a 'no' answer. One the Israelis commit to a mission, the issue becomes what tools are at hand to use to achieve its aims. Denied conventional weapons in the face of an 'existential threat', the use of nuclear weapons has to enter the tool set, with all the physical and political collateral damage that implies.

Mexico

Many have scoffed at our projections for the impact of Mexican violence (2006 release to clients), just as they had for the al-Qaeda precursors (1999) and LeT threats against India (2005). US response in the face of Mexican violence has now come to the public comment that the US has "completed a contingency plan for border violence, so if we did get a significant spillover, we have a surge - if I may use that word - capability to bring in not only [DHS] assets but even to work with the Defense Department" in suppressing cartel violence.

Some forms of collapse in Pakistan would carry with it the likelihood of a sustained violent and bloody civil and sectarian war, an even bigger haven for violent extremists, and the question of what would happen to its nuclear weapons. That "perfect storm" of uncertainty alone might require the engagement of U.S. and coalition forces into a situation of immense complexity and danger with no guarantee they could gain control of the weapons and with the real possibility that a nuclear weapon might be used.

The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police, and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and pressure by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state. Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the serious implications for homeland security alone.

The criteria by which I separate Mexico and Pakistan is that Mexico has no nuclear weapons. Had they fissile packages in their possession, I would rank Mexico as a higher risk than Pakistan.

The US is on the edge of a Pakistan, Iraq or Lebanon on its borders. My curiosity has shifted beyond when and what level to such topics as what scale of communications intercept are the US and cartels (who can buy the best) practicing against one another and to what tactical result; what level of commando teams are already operating in-country at a recon level; and what will our response be to captured US forces by the cartels.